It is known to provide automotive interiors with various trim assemblies to enhance the aesthetic appearance of the automotive interior and to provide comfort, as well as convenience, to vehicle occupants. Examples of these interior trim assemblies include instrument panels, door panels, and consoles. To increase the aesthetic appearance of the trim assemblies and to improve the comfort to vehicle occupants, it is often desired to provide at least portions, such as the armrests, of the trim assemblies with areas that are cushy or soft to the touch.
One primary drawback with current armrests is in the manufacturing and assembly thereof. Armrests having a soft feel, typically, have been formed by insertion of a resilient soft padding material beneath a pliable surface layer of leather, vinyl, or fabric material. The preformed, soft, resilient pad also may be secured to a rigid plastic shell and a pliable skin layer stretched over the pad and secured to the shell to form the trim assembly with soft feel armrest. In another conventional method of forming trim assemblies with padded armrests, a foam material may be injected between a rigid substrate and a skin layer joined to the substrate.
In addition, skin layers having bumps or nibs formed on the B-side, or back surface, thereof have been applied over rigid substrates in an effort to improve the feel of non-padded armrests. The nibs raise the skin layer slightly away from the rigid substrate to create “soft” areas that deform when a force is applied to the trim assembly. As such, it is the nib design, not the skin layer per se, that provides these soft areas. Also, while these nibbed trim assemblies offer a compromise between padded trim assemblies, they are still costly due to the fact that the skin layer must be manufactured separately in order to create the bumps or nibs. Consequently, the above noted methods are generally costly due to the multiple components and manufacturing steps required to make these trim assemblies.
There is thus a need for an improved armrest with a soft feel for use in a trim assembly, and a method for making the same, that reduces the number of parts and the labor required for assembly thereof thereby reducing overall manufacturing costs.